


Abandon

by Nary



Category: Ashes to Ashes
Genre: Biting, F/M, Post-Canon, Rough Sex, Vaginal Sex, Wall Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-07
Updated: 2010-11-07
Packaged: 2017-10-13 02:57:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/132061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nary/pseuds/Nary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Shouldn't it hurt more?</i> she thinks. <i>Things used to hurt.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Abandon

Alex isn't sure how long she's been at the pub. It's a good pub - good music, good beer, good company - and the hours seems to slip away. And for a long time, she doesn't really care, because she's happy, honestly happy for the first time since ...she can't remember when.

She can pinpoint the exact moment when things start to feel odd. She drops a pint glass and it shatters on the floor. She remembers bending to pick it up and finding nothing there, not even the spilled beer, but when she looks at her hand, it's bleeding from a shallow cut at the base of her thumb, and she can't feel it at all. _Shouldn't it hurt more?_ she thinks. _Things used to hurt. _She licks the cut and tastes water, not even salt water, and then even the cut itself is gone. _That's strange,_ she thinks, and then pushes it aside.__

The next strange thing is the moment when she's suddenly struck by the realization that she can't remember what colour her eyes are. She asks Shaz, but the girl just laughs as if she's told a joke. _A mirror,_ she thinks, and goes to find the loo. It's odd that in all this time in the pub, she's never gone to the loo, but they must have one somewhere. She makes her way to the barman, Nelson, and asks him.

He laughs too. "And what would you be wanting that for, hmm?"

"I just need to check something. Please. It's important." His usual grin fades away, but he jerks his chin in the direction of a corridor she hadn't noticed until that moment. "Come back soon," Nelson says, deadly serious for once.

It's a very long corridor, and the lights don't seem to be working properly. By the time she reaches the end, it's quite dark. She feels a door beneath her hands, and pushes her way in. The light inside buzzes and flickers, and the blue tiles are cracked. She feels blindly for the sink, knowing it should have a mirror above it, and breathes a sigh of relief when her hands touch cold porcelain. But she can't look yet, so instead she turns the water on, lets it run, and splashes some on her face, trying to clear her head. It tastes like her blood. She finally gathers her courage and looks up, not sure what she's expecting to see.

There's nothing there.

Alex staggers back, touching her face with both hands to reassure herself that it's still there. She pushes her way back into the dark hallway, but she can't quite remember which way is back to the pub. She can hear the music, but it's faint. Her hands find another door, metal, and she presses her palms against it, reassured by its solidity. It's heavy, so heavy, but she keeps pushing, and finally it opens for her, creaking as if it hasn't been touched in a thousand years.

She finds herself outside, in an alleyway cluttered with rubbish. She looks up and sees the stars, millions of them, so many that she feels as if she might fall into them and never return. A shiver at the back of her neck lets her know she's not alone. She whirls around and sees Keats standing there, his face illuminated by the glow of his cigarette. She had almost forgotten about Keats, she realizes, and wonders how much else she's forgotten.

"Lost, Alex?" His voice is soft, almost comforting.

"I don't know," she says. "I don't know where I'm supposed to be any longer."

He nods, as if this makes perfect sense. "Well," he says, "I could show you the way back inside. But there's nothing there for you but more of the same. Doesn't it get tedious? Start to feel a bit empty?" She nodded slowly. "As I thought. You were never cut out for that place, Alex. It's nice enough for those without ambition, but you... you were meant for more. Abandon it all and come with me."

"I don't think I can leave," she whispers.

"Don't be silly, Alex. You can always leave, if you make the right choices. If you want it badly enough."

He stubs out his cigarette on the ground, and she can smell the smoke on him as he steps closer and caresses her cheek. "You want to _feel_ , don't you, even if it means suffering." His thumb strokes the fullness of her lower lip, then pinches it, leaving it swollen and drawing tears from her eyes. She can't remember the last time something hurt, and suddenly she wants more.

They struggle briefly, but it's the kind of struggle where they're both ultimately aiming for the same goal. Keats shoves her against the wall, and she can feel the bricks against her back, rough, where her shirt's riding up, and it feels better than anything she can remember. He tugs up her skirt, tears at her knickers and tosses them away. Alex lifts her leg for him, helping him, and she laughs as he enters her, exulting in every sensation, every little ache and twinge and tear and rasp, every slick stroke and every hot breath against her neck, the taste of salt and brimstone on her tongue.

"What colour are my eyes?" she asks him, breaking his rhythm only for a moment.

"Sometimes grey, sometimes green," he tells her, and bites her on the shoulder, hard. She comes faster than she would have believed possible, and she clings to him more tightly still, feeling as if she's falling.

The light seems different when she looks around, brighter, red like a rising sun. "Is this the end?" she asks Keats, trying to steady her feet under her.

"It's a beginning," he says, sliding out of her and straightening his clothes, businesslike once more. She can feel him trickling down her leg, cold and clammy now, and it's not much, but at least it's something real. "I have a feeling we'll do great things together, the two of us. Working together, we could even take down that bastard Hunt... and why stop there?"

He keeps talking, but she's stopped listening. The name stirs something in her. Hunt... she'd forgotten him as well, even though it should have been nigh on impossible to forget Gene Bloody Hunt. "Take him... down?" Her head swims with vertigo, as if she's standing on a precipice, but she can't bring herself to look over its edge.

"As low as he can go," Keats agrees, looking smugly pleased with himself.

"No," Alex says, and for the first time Keats looks surprised. "I'm leaving."

"But we had a deal..."

"No, we had a quick fuck," Alex tells him, and enjoys the pained look on his face. "And now I'm off."

Keats is furious. "You can't leave!"

"Don't be silly," she says, but not unkindly. "I can always leave, if I make the right choices. If I want it badly enough. And I do." And then she walks away, leaving him behind her, not knowing where she's going but hopeful that she'll find her own way to wherever she needs to be.


End file.
